Email

Font Size

The study of warfare was long considered the province of historians, who relied on the narrative to analyze and understand the events, frequently celebrating the heroism of warriors. The bloody conflicts of the first half of the 20th century forced a reappraisal of warfare. Understanding the causes of armed conflict might provide insights in prevention. Sociologists believed their scientific analysis of data could quantify the causes of warfare in ways history could not. Pitirim Sorokan, in his three-volume Social and Cultural Dynamics (1937), argued that warfare was caused by the breakdown of social and cultural relationships, using compiled data in an attempt to define these trends in the history of European warfare. Quincy Wright, in his A Study of War (1942), relied on systemic information ...